ATGs with the weakest resumes?

It’s kinda hard to be an all time great and have a weak resume but I’ll throw out Carlos Deleon. Most wouldn’t consider him to be an ATG but he probably WAS one of the top 5 or 10 best cruisers of all time and I believe was a four time champion. He was also the first champion in a division that doesn’t have a long history so he’s sort of a great by default. But yeah his list of top wins isn’t terribly moving.

 

Ricardo Lopez.

I'm a big fan of Ohashi but when a past prime Ohashi is one of your best wins then you know you have a weak resume compared to other ATGS.

 

I don't consider him an ATG, but Aaron Pryor had a weak resume and his biggest win was tarnished.

 

Vitali Klitschko does not have a deep resume. I am not claiming that he has the weakest resume.

 

Definitely not an ATG and yes very tarnished.

 

Aaron Pryor wasn't great?

 

Gene Tunney, certainly at heavyweight.

 

I don't think so. His lack of defense would've seen him exposed by guys like Mayweather, Chavez, Whitaker, and possibly Tszyu. And there's not much in his resume to convince me otherwise. Someone like Cotto has a greater claim to being an ATG; although he never looked spectacular, his resume is undeniably better than someone like Pryor.

Edit: Terrence Crawford would've murdered Pryor.

 

Bob Foster

 

Although I don't personally rate him as an ATG, old-timers have adorned their lists with Jim Jeffries as one of the greatest heavies of all time. A real close look once the rose-colored specs are off tells the story of a fighter whose entire record is only 19-1-2 with 2 NDs, who won the title from a 36 year old fighter whom he had 40 pounds on. Also, that 2 of his greatest wins are over that same fighter in a rematch at 39, who cut him to pieces before getting KO'd and his first fight with Jim Corbett who, at 33, had boxed his ears off only to run into a shot in the 23rd round. Not very deep when you look at it that way.

 

Pryor didn't use defense like a conventional boxer. He swarmed opponents with non stop aggression and relentless work rate. He could switch to boxing when he needed to, but often felt it was unnecessary, as he knew he could overwhelm his opponent.

Another thing you have to remember is that fighters in that era that were safety first didn't get a lot of airtime. Exciting fights are what the networks wanted back then and many fighters obliged, to their eventual physical detriment.

I don't feel any of the boxers you mentioned would expose him. He may lose a couple of tight decisions, but I see ways for him to beat all of them.

 

The same could be said for Arturo Gatti, Shawn Porter, or James Kirkland. Caution to the wind rarely works against elite opponents. And I’m not going to give him credit for being a disciplined boxer because there’s little to go by.

Benitez was successful at the same time while being a pretty boring fighter. Ditto Holmes.

 

Boring fighters on prime time were few and far between. Exciting fighters who weren't even champions got better air time.

Kirkland, Gatti and Porter don't have one win between them that is the calibre of Aaron Pryor's greatest wins.